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Harden, newcomers step up on mound

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FORT MYERS, Fla. -- The Twins got their first look at a few new additions to their pitching staff, as newcomers Vance Worley, Rich Harden, Kevin Correia and Alex Meyer threw their first official bullpen sessions of the spring on Wednesday.

Pitching coach Rick Anderson supervised the bullpen sessions that were timed at about seven minutes each. Several top prospects also took part, such as Kyle Gibson, B.J. Hermsen and Jose Berrios.

But the bullpen session had a special significance for Harden, who was excited about how he felt considering he had shoulder surgery at this time last year and didn't pitch in '12.

"It felt pretty good," said Harden, who is trying to make the club as a non-roster invite. "It was fun. It was good to get back out there. I'm hoping it'll feel the same when I start facing hitters. I threw mostly fastballs because I'm trying to get that feel back."

Twins manager Ron Gardenhire didn't get a chance to watch the bullpen sessions because he was working with pitchers on another field, but he said the club had to change its usual plans with so many pitchers in camp this year.

"We've altered it because we have 32 healthy pitchers," Gardenhire said. "We have four groups so we added another field, another group and we're doing a few different things on it. We're going to do a few different things during batting practice, live BP and all that. We're changing it up a little bit.''